The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1887-02-08
The Vermont Central disaster.

Whether the terriblesaccident on the Yer
mont Central was wholly the result of I'M
ayoidable causes, or in part due to lack of
reasonable prudence and foresight on the
part OF the company or its employees, can
only be definitely ascertained by an investi-
CATION. The Vermont Central track is COM
posed Of the best steel rails, and apparently
everything had been done which was pos
sible to put it in first class condition
The rail that broke and hurled the train off
the bridge had been run over by trains as
heavy ss the one that broke /; hundreds of
times and in weather as cold as that of Fri
day night and had stood the strain 1t is
fair to presume, therefore, that the defect
If defect there was, was one that could
not have been detected by any test that 1t
was possible to apply, and therefore, if that
was the sole cause of the accident the rail-
road company was not responsible
But there is another element that must be
taken into account in deciding whether any
responsibility attaches to the company. 1t
is the speed at which the train was
moving. When the rail broke the train
was close to high bridge 1t is the
rule on almost all railroads when ap
preaching high bridge to slow up,
and on many to make complete stop.
Apparently one of these precautions was the
rule on the Vermont Central for the engi-
neer says the train was running only five or
six miles an hour, the speed having been
reduced in accordance with the custom when
approaching bridge. 1t is not asserted that
the train came to complete stop before pro-
ceedmg on to the bridge, but the engineer
does claim that he slowed up. The earliest
dispatches, however, all agreed that the train
was going at the rate of 20 or % miles an
hour, and certainly there is a good deal of
circumstantial evidence which goes to prove
that 1t was running faster than five or six
miles an hour.
The broken rail was encountered about 200
yards from the end of the bridge and the
passenger cars ran off on to the sleepers and
immediately broke away from the mail car.
Yet their momentum was sufficient to carry
them along the sleepers over these two hun
ured yards on to the end of the bridge where
they toppled over and fell into the river. 1t
seems hardly possible that the momentum
acquired from speed of only five or six
miles an hour would have sufficed to carry
them such distance under such circum-
stances. While speed of five or six miles an
hour, might not be Incompatible with reason
able care and prudence speed of twenty or
twenty-five miles at such place and on a
night when the mercury was below zero was
clearly not consistent with that reasonable
care which railroad companies are bound to
observe. Until the speed of the train is
definitely settled the railroad company can
not be acquitted of all blame.
Whether responsibility rests upon the
company for the holocaust that followed the
plunge of the cars from the bridge depends |
upon whether there are in existence any feas- |
IDLE inventions for heating andllighting cars |
except the coal stove and the oil lamp. II |
there are they should have been adopted, for |
the peril of these old fashioned contrivances
has been so frequently illustrated that the
lack of something to take their places can be